Sermons on important subjects by Rev. Paul C. Jong

The Lord Has Delivered Us From This Evil World

< Galatians 1:1-5 >

“Paul,
an apostle (not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the
Father who raised Him from the dead), and all the brethren who are
with me, To the churches of Galatia: Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord
Jesus Christ,who gave Himself for our sins, that He might deliver
us from this present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father,to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.”

To Save Us from This Evil
World, the Lord Gave up His Body to Us

In today’s sermon, I would like to focus on Galatians
1:4. It is written in this verse that Christ “gave Himself for our
sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age, according
to the will of our God and Father.” It is my sincere hope here that
you would all realize the profound Truth contained in this passage
within the bounds of the gospel of the water and the Spirit, and
to thus to gain great spiritual benefits.

This age is an evil age prevailed by sin. To deliver
us from this present evil age, the Lord wanted to offer His own
body to God the Father as our propitiation. That is why Jesus was
baptized, shed His blood to death on the Cross, rose from the dead
again, and has thereby saved us from all our sins once for all.

To save us from the sins of this world, Jesus completed
the gospel of the water and the Spirit and gave it to us. It is
our Lord who has delivered us from the sins of the world through
the gospel of the water and the Spirit. Put differently, it is through
this gospel of the water and the Spirit that the Lord has delivered
us from such an evil age. Therefore, we cannot but thank the Lord
for giving us this true gospel. Indeed, by offering His own body
to the Father, the Lord has brought true salvation to all of us
who believe in this. Now, by believing in the gospel of the water
and the Spirit, the Truth of perfect salvation, we have received
the complete remission of our sins.

By taking all our sins upon His body through His baptism
and dying on the Cross, the Lord offered one sacrifice for our sins
forever. And rising from the dead again in three days, He became
our true Savior, and He now sits at the right hand of God the Father.
However, countless people still do not believe in this perfect Truth
of salvation, and this is why their lives are ending in a failure.
It saddens me deeply to see how so many pastors and their followers
are still unable to grasp of the gospel Truth of the water and the
Spirit, and, as a result, think that they have to fight and overcome
their sins on their own. They are bound to hell even as they believe
in Jesus, for they believe themselves to be sinners imprisoned in
iniquities, all because of the daily sins they commit.

Although the Lord has perfectly saved everyone through
the gospel of the water and the Spirit, what use is it when all
these people do not believe in the gospel Truth and still retain
their sins? Now, all of us must realize that the Lord has completed
our everlasting salvation with the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
We must now come before the Lord with a clear understanding of and
faith in the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit, the gospel
that the Lord has given us.

I often see some pastors on TV preaching about Jesus
Christ’s work of redemption. Although they begin their sermons with
a great fanfare as “evangelical sermons” as if they were the disciples
of C. H. Spurgeon, in the end, they always end by concluding, “Let’s
live virtuously and faithfully.” In other words, they establish
their own standard of Christian ethics and morals, and then sermonize
to their congregation, “Let’s not fall into sin, but let’s fight
and overcome it.”

The issue here, however, is whether or not you could
really fight and overcome the sins of this world. Could we keep
the God-given Law perfectly in our lives? No, this is absolutely
impossible. The Lord Himself knew very well that you couldn’t possibly
fight and overcome this world’s sins, and that is precisely why
He took upon all the sins of mankind by being baptized by John,
was punished for these sins on the Cross in your place, rose form
the dead again, and has thereby saved you from the sins of the world.
We must never forget that the Lord has given us no other truth of
salvation but the gospel of the water and the Spirit.

Of course, all of us who believe in Jesus should indeed
fight and overcome the sins of this world, but to do so, we must
first be remitted from all our sins by believing in the gospel of
the water and the Spirit. It is because people do not believe in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit that virtually everyone remains
as a sinner enslaved to sin. We can never overcome sin if we were
to fight it on our own strength. Unless we receive the remission
of our sins and are born again through the gospel of the water and
the Spirit, we can never practice the righteousness of God, nor
overcome the power of sin.

Can You Win in Your Fight
against Sin?

For you to triumph over sin in your struggle against
it, you must first believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit
with your hearts, and thereby become sinless saints. In order to
give the gift of true salvation to us, who are incapable of tackling
and overcoming this world’s sins, Jesus Christ carried out righteous
works. He is the Savior who was baptized by John the Baptist, accepted
all the sins of this world once for all, and then shed His blood
on the Cross, thereby saving us from all our sins once for all.
Even though Jesus Christ has thus saved us from all sins by offering
His body to the Father as our propitiation, people still do not
know the gospel of the water and the Spirit, which is God’s gift
of true salvation, and so they are still living in this world as
sinners throughout their entire lifetime.

Therefore, those who don’t know the gospel of the
water and the Spirit and, as a result, still have sin in their hearts
must realize that they are fighting against their sins all in vain.
Those who have struggled to this day trying to solve the problem
of sin all on their own willpower and piety must now realize their
true selves and recognize who they really are. What we must grasp
properly here is that we cannot help but sin until the very day
we die.

It would be wonderful if everyone could live without
committing any sin, but no one can do this. Because we were all
born as a brood of evildoers, we can’t bear anything else but the
fruits of sin. All humans, in other words, are utterly frail beings
that cannot help but continue to sin before God throughout their
lives. That is precisely why it is only when we believe in the gospel
Truth of the water and the Spirit with our hearts, in the salvation
that the Lord has given us, that we can receive the remission of
our sins and be freed from them all.

Christians who have sin in their hearts at this point
ought to realize just how pitiful their souls are. They are of those
whose faith is a legalistic one, trying to be approved by God by
doing everything they can to keep the Law and refrain from committing
any sins, all because they still remain oblivious to the gospel
Truth of the water and the Spirit. It’s impossible not to describe
today’s believers with legalistic faith as fools. They try to be
washed from their sins outside the gospel Truth of the water and
the Spirit. These people must realize as soon as possible that no
matter how hard they might try to wash away their sins and sanctify
themselves with their prayers of repentance, it is completely impossible
for them to live freed from sin.

We need to realize here that the Lord is never pleased
to see people leading legalistic lives of faith. On the contrary,
He wants them to escape from such false, legalistic lives of faith
and believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit instead. Our
Lord knew very well that we could not fight and overcome all these
sins, and that is why He took upon all our sins through His baptism,
and paid off all their wages by shedding His blood on the Cross
to death. The Lord washed away all our sins with the Truth of His
water and blood. Therefore, every Christian sinner should believe
in the Lord-given gospel of the water and the Spirit right now,
and be saved from all his sins to be freed from the enslavement
of sin.

My dear fellow believers, could you really fight and
overcome all the sins that you commit everyday? Could you live without
committing any sin, just by trying? No, it’s impossible! By our
basic nature, we are fundamentally too feeble to fight and overcome
this world’s sins on our own. We should therefore admit our basic
frailty and inherent inability to avoid sin, and we must attain
our salvation by believing only in the gospel of the water and the
Spirit that the Lord has given us. If we do not recognize even our
own feebleness, remain ignorant of the gospel of the water and the
Spirit that has saved us from sin, and just follow the prevailing
trend to lead our lives of faith according to how others believe,
then we will forever end up as eternal failures.

To Deliver Us from This Evil
Age, the Lord Gave up His Body

The Apostle Paul said that the Lord “gave Himself
for our sins, that He might deliver us from this present evil age.”
What a truly amazing and blessed confession is this confession of
Paul’s faith? This confession proves that just like us, the Apostle
Paul also believed in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. The
faith of the Apostle Paul was one that believed in the Truth—that
when Jesus Christ was baptized, He took upon not only Paul’s sins,
but all the sins of the entire human race, and that Christ also
bore all the condemnation of the sins of mankind by being crucified.
For us as well, it is also because we knew and believed in the gospel
Truth of the water and the Spirit that we could be delivered from
all sins.

The gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit bestows
the perfect remission of sin once for all on all those who believe
in it. Our sins do not disappear just because we live virtuously
and practice many good deeds. Although you’ve some done good deeds,
you yourselves should know better that your virtuous deeds could
not free you from your sins. Therefore, rather than trying not to
sin on our own, it is much wiser for us to believe that our Lord
has completed our salvation with the gospel of the water and the
Spirit. The Lord is our Savior. He has made us whole once for all,
who believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. Only when
we are freed from all our sins and become sinless through our faith
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, can we then truly conquer
the power of sin and become victors. Would you not taste everlasting
life, receiving your salvation from all sins by placing your faith
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit?

Because we were fundamentally born with sin from our
very birth in this world, we had no choice but always be sinful.
However, through the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit, the
Lord has forever saved you and me from all the sins of this world
once for all. Although we are indeed living in this present evil
age, now, as we believe in Jesus Christ our Savior, we can stand
before God without fear trusting in the righteous works of our Lord.
I once again give all my thanks to the Lord for coming to this earth
to give us the gospel of the water and the Spirit.

Now, rather than trying to fight and overcome your
sins on your own, you should conquer them by believing with your
hearts in the gospel of the water and the Spirit that the Lord has
given you. You need to realize here that if you believe in this
gospel of the Lord, you will be more than able to overcome the world
(1 John 5:4-8). With all our hearts, we must believe in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit, the Truth of salvation that has saved
us from sin. Because we have received the remission of our sins
and been born again by believing in the gospel of the water and
the Spirit, it is now possible for us to carry out God’s work by
faith as the servants of Jesus Christ.

In other words, for those who now believe in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit, there can be no sin in their hearts.
It is by believing in the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit
that we are made wise, able to overcome our own frailty. No matter
what kind of sin you might have committed before God or fellow human
beings, once you believe in the gospel of the water and the Spirit,
you will no longer have anything to do with sin. Standing firmly
on this faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, from now
on you and I must live for the righteousness of God.

If you have already believed in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit, then you now have nothing to do with the sins
of this world. Because those who believe in this genuine gospel
have nothing to do with sin, they are God’s children, and those
who have become God’s children can live most energetically, for
they trust in the gospel of the water and the Spirit.

We must realize that it is when we live in this world
by trusting in the gospel of the water and the Spirit that God’s
grace and blessings descend on us in fullness. Those who have become
righteous by believing in the righteousness of God can now live
by their faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, always
giving thanks to God everyday, at each and every breath. Through
our faith in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, we must pass
our sins and weaknesses to the body of Jesus Christ, and, as well,
live our lives united with the Lord by faith.

The born-again must now gather together in God’s Church
and live their lives united with the gospel and serving God’s righteousness.
For us to gather together under our common faith in the gospel of
the water and the Spirit and live to serve the gospel is what pleases
God. That is why the Lord said, “How good and how pleasant it
is For brethren to dwell together in unity!” (Psalms 133:1).
The gospel of the water and the Spirit is the greatest gift that
God has given us. The Lord has bestowed us with this precious gift
from above. From now on, it is only proper for us to live inside
God’s Church, within the faith of believing in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit.

Indeed, we know that it is most appropriate for us
to live by faith, lead our families to God’s Church to be saved,
and to also take others into our family of faith that believes in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit. We should not try to please
God by sanctifying ourselves or doing some sort of good deeds on
our own. That is the way of Cain. We should abide only by our faith
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, and serve the Lord with
this faith.

What Does It Mean to Follow
a Different Gospel?

To us who believe in the gospel of the water and the
Spirit, what is the other gospel? It is the legalistic gospel that
throws us into confusion. What, then, is this legalistic gospel
that troubles us? Today’s legalistic gospel is one which claims
that people can be washed from their sins as white as snow by offering
prayers of repentance. Such a claim is fundamentally different from
the gospel of the water and the Spirit.

The gospel of the water and the Spirit is the Truth
proclaiming that Jesus Christ has saved us from sin through His
baptism and His blood on the Cross. The problem, however, is that
among today’s Christians in this world, few actually believe in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit, while there are too many
who believe in the groundless, legalistic gospel. Those who now
believe in such a legalistic gospel are devoted to their own prayers
of repentance, all in a futile attempt to wash away their sins.
It is such people’s faith that is causing so much trouble to the
Christians of this world. So many Christians believe in their own
thoughts as the Truth, rather than in the gospel of the water and
the Spirit, and that is why it is such a serious problem.

The gospel of the water and the Spirit is clearly
distinct from any other legalistic gospel. And only the gospel of
the water and the Spirit is the gospel of Truth that the Bible speaks
of. It’s unmistakably clear that our Lord has saved us from all
the sins of this world by coming to this earth, taking our sins
upon His body through His baptism, and dying on the Cross.

Tragically, however, mainstream Christianity does
not believe in the true gospel, but it only teaches that while original
sin is forgiven when one first believes in Jesus, he must still
seek the remission of his personal sins by offering prayers of repentance
everyday. It also teaches as the following: “While we are now considered
righteous for believing in Jesus, this does not mean that we have
no sin. It only means that God calls us righteous on account of
the work of Jesus, even though we are still sinners. Therefore we
should try our best not to commit sin. Since the Bible says, ‘Therefore,
my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only,
but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with
fear and trembling’ (Philippians 2:12), we must repent everyday
and embark on the way of sanctification.”

My fellow believers, could anyone really be saved
from his sins by believing like this? How could we fight and overcome
sin on our own? Of course, we should indeed fight and defeat sin,
but how could we achieve this unless we have faith in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit? Could you battle and overcome the sins
of the world just by resolving yourselves on your own will, “I’ll
never commit any more sin,” and trying?

No, you could never accomplish this. The Bible declares,
“Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard its spots?
Then may you also do good who are accustomed to do evil” (Jeremiah
13:23). The more you try not to fall into the sins of this world,
the more you will discover your fundamental selves falling even
deeper into this world’s sins.

Some people then worry, “If it’s definitively true
that the believers in the gospel of the water and the Spirit are
sinless even if they sin, then wouldn’t they commit even more sins
in the future?” Such a worry, however, is only a product of your
disbelief in the gospel of the water and the Spirit. There is absolutely
no need to worry like this. Between someone who is in clean clothes
and someone who is in dirty clothes, who would be more careful not
to soil his clothes?

Since the believers the gospel of the water and the
Spirit have no sin, and since they have been saved from the sins
of the world, they have all the more reason to loathe to live their
lives following sin. From the perspective of someone who believes
in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, even if he commits sin,
the Lord has already solved it away, and so his desire to commit
sin itself is significantly reduced. When one remains sinless even
when he commits sin, there is neither any thrill nor any excitement
in committing sin, and therefore he naturally distances himself
from sin.

The Apostle Paul said that he was astonished to see
the Galatian saints following a different gospel so easily, and
he further declared that there could be no other gospel. Moreover,
he also made it clear that anyone who preaches another gospel will
be accursed, even if he were an angel from Heaven. As such, God
will actually curse those who preach the legalistic gospel that
throws people into confusion and unsettles their hearts. All that
awaits them is God’s curse to be cast into the raging fire of hell.

Is there anyone among you, by any chance, who is looking
for another teaching other than the gospel of the water and the
Spirit? God’s Church is a place that treasures and preaches the
gospel Word of the water and the Spirit. But some people take this
gospel too lightly, and say to themselves, “Uh-oh, there he goes
again, saying the same thing over and over. He makes me so sleepy!”
Such people would be happier if they were just to go to some revival
meetings, where praises are sung in fits and sermons are preached
fanatically. Or otherwise they would be happier if they were to
hear a legalistic gospel emphasizing ethics and morals, and extolling
them to live virtuously. However, any gospel other than the gospel
of the water and the Spirit is a false gospel that came from the
Devil himself.

We should therefore realize how wonderful it is that
God’s Church is preaching the gospel of the water and the Spirit.
Indeed, it’s such a marvelous blessing to accept this gospel into
our hearts and believe in it, for we will find peace of mind. All
the teachings of the Bible are properly established as correct teachings
only when they are interpreted and applied within the gospel of
the water and the Spirit. If you begin to understand God’s Word
within this gospel of Truth, then the Word will plant itself deep
in your hearts, and you will discover an even greater joy. If, on
the other hand, your hearts do not clearly believe in the gospel
Word of the water and the Spirit, and you do not hold fast to the
Truth, then you will only live as sinners to the end.

Those who stand against the gospel of the water and
the Spirit the most are sectarians and charismatics. Yet right now
it’s such people who form the mainstream of Christianity. In reality,
they are only preaching a different gospel. Charismatics believe
that if they throw themselves into fits with the deafening sound
of a rock band and pray to God fervently, God would somehow give
them the Holy Spirit and His gifts. They have no interest in the
remission of sin, but only in material blessings, healing, or speaking
in tongues. And so even as they profess to believe in Jesus as their
Savior, their sins still remain in their hearts. When someone with
sin exercises the gifts of the Holy Spirit, isn’t this itself practicing
lawlessness? Those who practice lawlessness before God are those
who prophesy even though their hearts still remain sinful (Matthew
7:23).

In addition, evangelicals are also found among the
ferocious opponents of the gospel of the water and the Spirit. These
people teach that if anyone just believes in Jesus as his Savior,
then he is sinless unconditionally. They blindly believe themselves
to be sinless even though they actually remain sinful. They all
have nothing more than false beliefs. This age has now turned into
an age when even the other gospels other than the genuine gospel
of the water and the Spirit are losing their steam and withering
away, but the problem is that their advocates have made people sick
and tired of Christianity with their false gospels. In short, they
are making people stay away from Jesus.

In other words, what the Bible says has now come to
pass: “For the time will come when they will not endure sound
doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have
itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they
will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to
fables” (2 Timothy 4:3-4). People listen so closely whenever
they hear something that is beneficial to their flesh. As materialism
has come to rule supreme on this earth, so many people are so bitterly
obsessed with money that even churches teach that one would become
rich if he gave a lot of offerings.

My fellow believers, would your sins disappear if
you were to offer countless prayers of repentance? Would you receive
the Holy Spirit if you were to pray fanatically? No, that is absolutely
not true! When you offer prayers of repentance, your hearts feel
peaceful just for a short while, only as a matter of self-induced
placebo effect. How can anyone who has sin in his heart dare to
try to receive the Holy Spirit? You must grasp that the Holy Spirit
is not received in this way, just by insisting on it. That’s because
God the Holy Spirit is not One who comes and goes on your command.
Anyone who has not received the remission of his sins can never
receive the Holy Spirit. Therefore, if someone who has sin in his
heart claims to have received the Holy Spirit, and goes on to cause
all kinds of racket, speaking in tongues and pretentiously praying
to heal others from illnesses, then there can no doubt whatsoever
that what he has received is not the Holy Spirit, but an evil spirit.

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The Bible says, “Repent, and let every one of you
be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins;
and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit” (Acts 2:38).
In other words, the Holy Spirit is the gift of God bestowed on those
who are washed from all their sins by believing in the gospel of
the water and the Spirit, and whose hearts are therefore completely
sinless. Accordingly, unless one is washed from all his sins by
believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit, he cannot receive
the gift of the Spirit of God. The Holy Spirit is the holy God Himself
who cannot abide anywhere there is sin. That is why one can receive
the gift of the Holy Spirit only if he is washed from all his sins.

Although the legalistic gospel is now prevailing over
Christian communities in this evil age, we who believe in the gospel
of the water and the Spirit must never tolerate such a gospel. So,
I am even more grateful to God that He has delivered me from such
an evil age. We had been deceived by a different gospel, false and
confused, but by believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit,
we have received the gift of the Holy Spirit, and we have come to
do God’s work and follow His Truth and righteousness.

My fellow believers, are you joyful that God has entrusted
you with the task of spreading the gospel of the water and the Spirit?
Or do you find it too hard to carry out what has been entrusted
to you? Although there are times when we get weary, we still thank
God for the salvation that He has given us, and for allowing us
to live in His Church.

It is my sincerest desire that both you and I would
continue to believe in and proclaim the gospel of the water and
the Spirit until the end of the world, and to live by God’s grace
in hope.